ServiceNow, Workday, Tesla, and other popular global corporations persistently mark the top positions in the most innovative companies in the world. With more firms competing to enter the list every year, it is clear that workplace innovation is essential for profitability, employee retention, and market growth rate.
But how do we go about it? What is their secret sauce for creating a workplace for innovation?
Well, there is no forthright answer to these questions. Every firm develops a game plan via trial and error and implements the one that yields the best outcomes.
However, they are stressed to revolve around a few universal business strategies to encourage innovation in the workplace.
Continue reading to learn more about how to approach these strategies.
1) Dedramatize Failure
A workplace for innovation is a place where experimenting is valued. James Quincey, CEO of Coca-Cola believes that if you are not making mistakes, you are not trying hard enough.
Failure is the bedrock of almost any successful business. When you nurture an explorer's attitude in your employees and encourage them to explore new dimensions, take risks, and strive until they find a solution, your business will be on its way to innovation.
Amazon strives to come up with amazing inventions based on the premise, "if the size of your failure isn't growing, then you are not going to be investing in a size that can move the needle."
2) One-Team Mentality
Having a concise, strategic objective for your firm encourages your staff to strive towards a shared goal.
Instead of segmenting your workforce into different departments with department-specific goals, establish one purpose shared across all departments and teams. Everyone engaged in the problem-solving process benefits from this since it reinforces that no problem is someone else's problem.
Square, a mobile payment firm, is an excellent illustration of this. They make all meeting minutes available to everyone in the organization to encourage innovation in the workplace. As a result, everyone is aware of their duties and is working towards the same objective. It also facilitates efficient inter-departmental communication.
3) Employee-Centric System
Employees are only as innovative as you allow them to be.
The magnitude of innovation depends on whether you treat them with concierge-level services like Google or suffocate them in cramped confines and placemat-sized tabletops. Being innovative or thinking outside of the box will be the last thing on your employees' minds when they are swamped with day-to-day tasks and pressured by hegemony.
To put it simply, you can encourage innovation in the workplace by enabling open communication, fostering work-life balance, and motivating continual invention rather than instant perfection.
Megacorps like 3M, Google are famous for giving their employees time for blue-sky thinking, a culture for social growth, and an environment of mutual aid for quality decisions.
4) Networking
Interdepartmental collaboration is an intelligent method to increase the intellectual capital of your organization.
By cross-pollination between divisions, employees can exchange ideas and dwell on problems they wouldn't otherwise have the time to discuss. Besides helping employees solve problems, it provides a nice reprieve from strenuous daily tasks.
One thing to keep in mind is that ideas require fast action. To quickly act on the new recommendation, you need help from other departments or external audiences like clients, customers, or industry experts.
In this sense, networking isn't just about producing ideas but also about perceiving things from others perspectives.
Summary
Recognizing that innovation is situational and that failures are a springboard for bolder initiatives in subsequent years is a golden rule to encourage innovation in the workplace.
Be on the lookout for any inclination for you or your team to make quick judgments. An open mind when it comes to ideas that come from instinct or hunches is necessary.
Together with the above tenets, a flat- management system, an appetite for new ways of doing things, and deploring managers behind closed doors can be the key to unlocking the wealth of ideas in your employees.
If you are a solopreneur or a business with an urge for innovation, then a place with a window of opportunity for new ideas and clients under one roof like the one at Iconic Workspaces can be your prime spot.
